


Beacon's Paranormal Investigators

by softSnowdrop



Category: RWBY
Genre: No Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-22
Updated: 2017-12-22
Packaged: 2019-02-18 10:44:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13098435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softSnowdrop/pseuds/softSnowdrop
Summary: Nora tells about a ghost. Ruby insists on finding that ghost. Weiss hides her love for cheesy ghost hunting shows.





	1. Chapter 1

                Nora rocked left in right in her seat as she held her circle-formed fingers up to her eyes, as though they were glasses. “I saw it with my own two eyes; you guys have to listen!” She beamed. When Ren sighed, she lowered her hands and pouted at him. “Seriously, this one won’t believe me!”

                “I just think that it’s more plausible that either a very pale student is going and getting something to eat at night, or someone is using their semblance to project into the student lounge.” He paused, looking at Nora’s pouting expression. “It could even be a Geist without a host. It _is_ midterm, after all, so this place is just crawling with negativity. A _ghost_ just doesn’t seem likely, Nora.”

                “See! Pure disbelief! How am I supposed to survive without a partner that trusts me!?” Nora faceplanted on the table as she cried. “I’m doomed—doomed! He won’t even come out and investigate with me.”

                “That’s because we’re all asleep. Pyrrha and I go to bed early; you and Jaune stay up later than you should.”

                While Nora was wired every morning, despite getting on-average three or four hours of sleep, the same couldn’t be said for Jaune; he was face-first on his toast, snoring, with messy hair, and dark circles under his eyes.

                Weiss spoke up; skeptical of this whole ‘ghost’ story that Nora had been feeding them for the past few days. “Then do you mind us asking what _you_ were doing up at three in the morning? How do we know _you’re_ not the ghost, and that you’re not trying to scare us?”

                “Oh! Well, I heard that Beacon was haunted—specifically something was getting into the fridge really late at night, and—”

                “It’s definitely a student, then.” Blake glanced up from her book—only for a moment—to look across the table at the other.

                “Yeah, I’m… Gonna have to side with Blake on this one.” Yang chimed in, though it was muffled by the concerning amount of French toast she had crammed into her mouth. “Seriously, a ghost?”

                “Okay, but! What student has some sorta pure-white-ethereal glow to them when the moonlight hits them through the windows?”

                Not only did Pyrrha and Ren look to Weiss, but the entirety of Team RWBY side-eyed her.

                “Wait, why are you all looking at—hey!” Weiss retorted. “Seriously, I don’t go around the school wailing, digging through the fridge, and making a mess of things late at night. I need my beauty sleep.”

                “Hey, now, nobody said anything about wailing.” Yang grinned a bit and gave her a gentle nudge. “I don’t think your singing classifies as ghostly wails. Haunting? Sure, it can be. But wails? Nah.”

                Weiss gave a quiet ‘hmph’ and rolled her eyes. “Okay, but still. I’m _not_ the ghost.”

                “The only solution here is to get up and find out for ourselves!” Ruby slammed her hands on the table, startling Jaune awake, and causing Blake to jump. “We’ll enlist some of our closest friends and make up Beacon’s Top Ghost Investigators!”

                “No.” Weiss frowned at Ruby’s suggestion; not only was that the least helpful plan, but she would have them up for half the night, chasing something that didn’t even exist.

                “Sorry, Jaune and I will have to pass,” Pyrrha spoke up, taking a napkin and wiping a bit of leftover butter from the now-dazed and half-asleep Jaune’s face. “He’s going to spend the night sleeping. Like he should be.”

                “I’m going to have to abstain, as well.” Ren added; looking at his teammates. “If I don’t sleep well, I perform worse in physical training.”

                “Well! Count _me_ in!” Nora clapped before gripping the edge of the table and leaning forward, pivoting her head from side-to-side to look at her teammates and friends. “You’re all a bunch’a losers.”

                “Thanks, Nora.” Jaune groaned, now taking the napkin from Pyrrha and wiping off the remaining butter from his forehead and the bridge of his nose. “Really reassuring to hear you say that about us all.”

                “Well, I guess I’ll go with you, too, Ruby.” Yang sighed, a smile tugging at her lips. “I can’t just have my baby sister running around the school all night, causing trouble without me, can I?”

                She looked over at Blake now, who was still locked into her book. “Blake? Are you in?”

                “Oh, sure.” Blake murmured while turning a page; she was obviously lost amongst the words, hyperfixated on whatever event was taking place on the pages, but Yang still accepted the answer as a definite yes. “Just tell me when we’re leaving.”

                “Sweet! Weiss, c’mon,” She leaned forward a bit, looking past Blake and giving Weiss her signature pout. “please? We can’t do this without you.”

                “No. I’m not going with you guys on some wild goose chase.”

                Yang clasped her hands together and forced fake tears to well in her eyes. “Weiss, please, what will we do without you? We need guidance and reassur—”

                “Fine. If it’ll get you to stop it with the crocodile tears, I’ll join you.” She rolled her eyes again and huffed—though she seemed frustrated, a small light came into her eyes and a smile tugged at her lips. “We have tomorrow off, anyway.” She continued. “So… I guess it couldn’t hurt to stay up a little later than usual. Just this once, though. Don’t expect me to carry on with your crazy schemes again, got it?”

                “Yes! Thank you, Weiss!”

                “I’ll head into Vale today and get what we need?” Ruby shined; she wiggled in her seat as she watched the others at her table. “Nora, wanna meet us in the courtyard at twelve?”

                Nora nodded, clapping her hands together. “Hell yeah! That’s perfect!”

                Yang furrowed her brow and raised a hand before talking. “Ruby, maybe don’t blow the allowance dad gave you this month on expensive equipment, alright?” She smiled a bit, but it wasn’t her normal, confident, and friendly smile; it leaned towards concerned and on-edge. “Seriously, if you do, I am _not_ buying you any of the games or books you’re wanting.”

                “Psh, I’ll spend what I need to for _science_.”

                “Mmkay, I’m just warning you.”

               

                After a few minutes of vigorous writing and breaking the point of her pencil multiple times, Ruby tore three scraps out of her notebook. “Here! This is what everyone is going to be doing between classes, before we meet up.”

                She still beamed as she started to explain the jobs. “Blake, Yang—you two are on history! You find out what dark tragedies happened here to cause this paranormal activity. Nora? You get the lore. Not the actual historical documentation of the school, you’ve gotta get the rumors. Weiss? We’re going out and getting some shots to make our intro video.”

                “Intro video?” Weiss grimaced at the words. “Oh, no, we are not recording this.”

                “But we have to! Weiss, come on, really.” Ruby pouted; her usual puppy-dog face that would convince Weiss of literally anything unreasonable. “What if we see an actual ghost? What if they talk to us?”

                It didn’t even take Ruby’s puppy-dog eyes to break her. Weiss rolled her eyes, hid a smile, and gave a quiet “Sure, fine, whatever.”

                “Why did you stick me and Blake on finding out the historical facts?”

                “I figured it would be right up Blake’s alley? Ooh, maybe you could record some interviews with some of the teachers?”


	2. Chapter 2

                “ _Beacon Academy. One of Remnant’s top schools for hunters, for heroes, and for ghosts. Just by looking at the school during the day, you wouldn’t be able to tell that dark energies reside in these halls, that corruption, death, and destruction all have made themselves known here—_ "

                “Ruby, do you _have_ to do some sort of cheesy intro?” Weiss sighed. “ _I can’t believe I let you and your sister drag me into this._ ” She murmured under her breath.

                “Yes! I do, thank you very much!” Ruby puffed her cheeks out and crossed her arms. “Just hold my scroll still while I narrate?”

                “You know, usually they just get the footage, turn it into a time lapse, and then edit their narration over it, right?” Weiss clenched her jaw the moment her criticism left her own mouth; she quickly averted her gaze and tried to cover for herself. “I mean, I assume that’s what they do.”

                She added in an eye-roll—she absolutely didn’t want Ruby to know what she watched when nobody was looking.

                “Weiss, do you like ghost hunting shows?” Ruby’s shoulders drooped, and she squinted at the other.

                “No, you dolt. Seriously, don’t act like I know about them just because I threw out something that _should_ be common knowledge about video editing.” She scoffed and folded her arms. “Come on, let’s just get this silly introduction over with so we can keep shooting around the school.”

                “Weiss, seriously, if you’re a fan of them, you can tell me—I won’t tell anyone else. My dad, Yang, and I used to watch them when I was little—”

                “I don’t like them.” Weiss snapped, angling her brows and glaring at Ruby for a brief second.

                “Okay, okay, fine,” Ruby sighed. “there’s no need to get defensive.”

               

                While filming some popular locations around the school—such as empty hallways, the statue, the main courtyard, and so on, Weiss couldn’t help but smile a bit; she held the camera so that Ruby’s speaking wouldn’t cause her hands to shake, or so that Ruby could be on camera, and she couldn’t help but stifle a laugh or a large smile every time Ruby’s clumsiness got the best of her, or every time she would get really into what she was saying.

                It was just really endearing to watch her be so excited and happy, even if it _was_ over something as silly as a ghost hunt.

                This video was going to be an absolute mess, but she didn’t mind. She was _actually_ enjoying herself with the process.

                “Ooh,” Ruby spoke up, interrupting Weiss’s thoughts. “Weiss, do you think Velvet would let us use her camera for flash-photography? ‘Cos otherwise, I’m gonna have to buy either a really cheap camera and then develop the film, or I’m gonna have to buy a really nice camera that lets us upload the pictures to one of our scrolls or laptops.”

                “We are not involving Team CFVY in this.” Weiss frowned at the suggestion. “I’ll pay for a camera, but let’s… Just get a little bit more use out of it than just ghost hunting. Okay?”

                Ruby lit up again, and she threw her arms around Weiss’s neck in a tight hug. “Really?? Thank you so, so much, Weiss! I can’t wait!”

                “G-geez, there’s no need for you to jump on me without warning!” Weiss fussed, though she slowly put her arms around the other and hugged her back. “Are we ready to go into town and get what we need?”

                “I think we got all we need from our location shots, sooo, yeah!” Ruby took her arms away from Weiss’s neck, and wiggled in-place in front of her. “Let’s catch the next ship off of Beacon?”

 

                “Remind me why we’re going to be interviewing Professor Ozpin, Glynda, Port, and Plum? And why we’re in the library with just about every book on the history of Beacon?” Blake asked dryly. “It’s study hall, usually we’re training with Team JNPR.”

                “Geez, you were really out of it this morning, weren’t you?”

                “No, I was distracted.”

                “Well, either way, you kinda agreed to help us hunt some ghosts tonight? Nora says there’s a ghost, Ren says there isn’t, so we’re gonna figure that out tonight.”

                “Okay, and?”

                “Ruby assigned us to historical research. It’s kind of a bummer,” Yang shrugged her shoulders, placing the mountain of books she had been carrying on one of the tables. “but, y’know. She said this would be right up your alley.”

                “She said that because I’m the fastest reader, didn’t she?” Blake sighed, pulling the first book off of the stack and flipping to the end of it.

                “Ye-ap.” Yang pulled the next book off and opened to the middle; she scanned the words on the page, but when she found nothing of interest, she laid the book down—open-spined—and buried her face in it with a groan. “God, I wish she had let us take on getting rumors.”

                “It would definitely suit you better than doing this.” Blake laughed a little, glancing up from the book and chuckling quietly at Yang. “You’re going to be bored to death; since we’re here, does that mean Ruby and Weiss are getting the rumors?”

                “No, they’re walking around campus and getting video footage. Nora is figuring out the stories.”

                “I figured this would be something Weiss would want to do—getting the facts, I mean.”

                “Yeah, me, too, but Ruby put us where she put us. So, I guess that means she feels like this is where we’re best-suited.”

                “Or she just threw us in random places out of excitement? With no actual planning?”

                “Yeah, okay, or that. She does better with battle strategy, not research strategies.”

                “You’re right; she can strategize fast on the battle field, but… Not so much at the breakfast table.”

                Yang raised herself from her pillow of a book, a sly grin crossing her lips. “Hey, wanna just skip out on bookwork, get some lunch, and then just use our scrolls to look up ‘ _Dark Events In Beacon’s History_ ’?”

                Blake immediately slammed her own book shut, and breathed an audible, relaxed sigh. “I thought you would never ask, Yang.” She shot a shared, slick smile with the other, and quickly stood up. “I’ve been ready to do that ever since we started.”

                “You should have just said something. Let’s get out of here.”


	3. Chapter 3

                “What made you guys take so loooong?” Nora called out, seeing the four enter from the courtyard. She groaned and hopped down from the bench she stood on, waiting as a lookout for RWBY. “I’ve been waiting here for hours!”

                “It’s literally ten minutes before we’re supposed to meet?” Blake mentioned, pointing at the clock on her scroll.

                “Ren said you had been out here for like, twenty minutes, so we came on down.” Yang added. “It’s a little early for us to meet up.”

                “Okay, and? So? If we’re gonna track down a ghost, we’ve gotta have a good battle strategy.”

                Weiss didn’t hesitate to bring in her skepticism; she kept her voice clear and calm, though her agitation was present by her wrinkled nose. “Nora, do you really think we’re going to find a ghost?”

                “Well, duh, of course we’re going to find a ghost!” She puffed her chest out and held her fists at her hips; she stood proud and as tall as she could. “What else would we find?”

                “A raccoon, another student—” Blake started to list off the possibilities, but was cut short by Ruby.

                “A grimm?” Ruby raised her index finger, looking between her teammates and Nora. “Ren suggested that it might be a geist, but that _might_ be a little bit too much to go unnoticed here.”

                “Yeah,” Yang played off of Ruby’s words. “Professor Goodwitch would’ve already ran the thing off with how pissed off she always is.”

                Ruby snickered; her sister was right. Not even a grimm would stick around to see Professor Goodwitch go off.

                “Okay, well, since we’re early, what’d you guys find out? Yang, Blake?”

                Yang started, pulling her scroll up for a reference. “Well, we did a lot of reading and took some notes—”

                Blake smiled and rolled her eyes. “We looked it up online.”

                “Blake, hey!”

                “She’s literally reading from one of the articles we found right now.”

                “Blake, come on, at least let us try to seem like we put more effort into this than just looking around online.”

                She couldn’t help but laugh a little at Yang’s scowl. “What? This is a valid way to get information.”

                “Anyway,” Yang cleared her throat and continued, her eyes glued to the scroll as she read. “according to this, one professor had a heart attack after a Halloween event? Some of the students worked together and apparently had a _really_ good Beringel costume, and it scared the poor man to death. Literally.”

                “Is there any actual documentation of that happening, though?” Weiss squinted at the two, furrowing her brow in disbelief. “Schools _always_ have some kind of weird made-up death story.”

                “Well, no, it’s just on this one forum where students are talking about—”

                “ _Of course_ they won’t have any sort of _actual_ documentation, silly!” Nora interrupted Yang, leaning forward and poking Weiss’s nose. “Big schools like this don’t want anything like that slipping out into the public! As long as they can keep something like that from spreading, they’re gonna do their best.”

                “So you’re saying you think that was a scandal? They tried to cover up the deaths?” Ruby’s eyes shimmered in the lamppost light.

                “Absolutely! They wouldn’t want something like faculty death to tarnish their reputation, would they?”

                “People… Die all the time, Nora.” Blake added quietly. “A lot of teachers have died from other ways—natural causes, on the battlefield, you name it—and have worked here.”

                “Okay, but did they die on _school grounds_?”

                “We don’t even know if _that_ one actually died here, though.” Weiss chimed in again, rolling her eyes at Nora’s persistence. “I really just don’t believe it’s true.”

                “Fine, fine, think what you want, but wait until you hear this!” Nora clapped her hands together twice before leaning in towards the four; the other four followed-suit and leaned in towards her, creating a little huddle as Nora spoke with a low, dark tone. “Every single student I’ve talked to said they hear crying and moaning from the wing that Haven academy is in. Right next to the student lounge where the reported hauntings are! It usually starts at like, two or three in the morning.”

                “Seriously? That could just be someone who got their ass whooped during physical training, though.” Yang sighed. “I’m starting to get skeptical, myself.”

                “I think it’s a pretty great lead.” Ruby said, a confident smile forming on her lips. “Okay, so, you guys wanna look around the school for any other spooky spottings first, and then we can look at the student lounge?”

                “Sure, we’ve got some time to kill, so?” Yang gave a shrug. “If everyone else is fine with that, so am I.”

                “If whatever is showing up to make those noises and the mess isn’t going to show up until later, then there’s no point in waiting there all night.” Weiss gave a small nod. “So, I also think it’s best that we spend some time walking around.”

                “I’m fine doing whatever,” Blake said, looking at the others standing around her. “I really don’t mind?”

                “So,  then it’s settled? We’ve got a decent strategy, all of our scrolls are fully charged—” Everyone simultaneously checked their scrolls before giving a small nod. “we’re all ready to hunt some ghosts!”


	4. Chapter 4

                 Weiss, holding her scroll so that its flashlight shone down the long hallway of the eastern dorms, glanced over at her teammates and friend; Ruby, who was setting up a camera she had picked up in Vale on a tripod, Blake, who was talking to Yang about how they hadn’t found anything about Beacon Academy’s ‘dark history’, and Nora, who was just glad to be there, bouncing between a conversation with Ruby, and the conversation with Yang and Blake.

                “Weiss! Can you do me a favor and turn off your light?” Ruby looked over at her, a wide grin plastered on her face; she held her finger tips over one of the buttons on the side of the camera. “There’s something I wanna test out.”

                “It’s going to be almost pitch-black in here if I do that. Are you sure?”

                “Yeah! Just lemme try this, okay?”

                Weiss sighed softly and turned the flashlight on her scroll off before closing it, leaving the group in near-darkness—aside from the incredibly dim night lights the hall offered, and Ruby’s camera. “There. Were you checking to see if your camera’s night vision worked?”

                “Yyyyep!” Ruby beamed. “You can turn your scroll back on now?”

                Weiss did so—much faster than anyone else had expected—and breathed a quiet sigh of relief when she managed to get her scroll’s light back on. “Well, did it work?”

                “Sure did! Good thing, too. Iii paid a pretty penny for this thing…”

                “Ruby,” Yang groaned. “What did I tell you about spending your allowance?”

                “Pffshh, it’s fine! We can use this for a lot of stuff! Liiike…” Ruby trailed off, her eyes drifting to the corner as her smile started to fade into stern contemplation. “Like…”

                “Like when we’re out on field missions overnight?” Blake spoke up, raising an eyebrow.

                “Psh, we haven’t been on one of those since the train incident.”

                Yang grimaced, audibly sucking in air through her teeth as Ruby mentioned the train incident. “Ooh, yikes. Yeah, after that, I don’t really think Professor Ozpin is gonna clear us on too many overnight missions.”

                Ruby was quick to jump back into the conversation and correct her sister. “Okay, _but_! I bet it has plenty of other uses.” Her eyes shimmered with silver confidence as she thought briefly. “Like, for example, if we want to walk around the school grounds at night! For any other reason!”

                “Other than hunting ghosts, you mean?” Yang held back a chuckle; she couldn’t think of any other reason they would be wandering around school grounds past curfew.

                “Yeah! Yeah, like late-night stealth training.” Ruby’s expression intensified—she was dead-set on making sure she could think of some sort of use for this camera. “Anyways, it’s ghost hunting time! Let’s go.”

 

                Hours passed as the group wandered the school—since this was the main campus, none of the nocturnal “night class” students (who were mostly faunus) were active in this segment of the school, meaning they had the entire grounds dorm section to themselves—with the exception of the occasional student, wandering to their hallway’s designated bathroom or break room.

                “Guys,” Nora whispered, now gripping Ruby’s cape and giving it a quick tug. “It’s almost time! We gotta go to the break room near Haven Academy’s dorms!”

                “Okay, c’mon, let’s go, Team RWBY!” Ruby commanded, picking up a brisk pace towards the dorms with Nora.

                Yang, sighing quietly and looking at her lagging-behind teammates with a slightly-exhausted smile, couldn’t help but force out a chuckle. “You guys, I know it’s only two in the morning, but I’m beat after following Nora and Ruby around.”

                “Me, too.” Blake shook her head and forced a tiny smile. “I love her, but gods, you two, I’m so tired.”

                “I vote we all sleep in tomorrow.”

                Yang gasped at Weiss’s suggestion, she gave her a gentle nudge with her elbow. “Weiss Schnee? Sleeping in? That’s not like you!”

                “It’s two in the morning—I need my sleep, or else I don’t function well. And it’s like I said—we have tomorrow off. No missions, no training, no classes—we can just relax and treat ourselves.” _We are_ so _going to need to treat ourselves after tonight._ She added silently.

                “I love it when you break your own rules.”

 

                They covered the rather long distance in just a few minutes, and Ruby already had her camera up and ready by the time they got there.

                Nora pressed her ear to the door, listening in, surprisingly, silence while the others watched her. “Okay, so,” She whispered quietly as she pulled away from the wooden door, “I hear something rustling, and I thought I heard someone moaning. Meaning I think we’ve got our ghost.”

                “Or a student,” Blake added. “seriously, why are you so hellbent on it being a ghost?”

                “Because, that’s what it is! I saw a pasty, white figure wobbling in here! And then when I came back to check, it was gone and there was just a mess! Why would a student leave their mess?”

                Yang added to the conversation, still obviously not falling for Nora’s explanation. “Because they were lazy, or just because they were a little fucked up and low on their functioning skills for the night.”

                “Guysss, come on, let’s just open the door, okay?”

                “If we make some poor student scream, Professor Goodwitch won’t let us hear the end of it.” Weiss whispered rather harshly, lightly gripping Ruby’s shoulder. “She’ll probably revoke our nighttime privileges, too.”

                “Okay, and what if it’s literally a ghost?”

                “Okay, okay, just. Don’t expect me to stand up for you when someone screams.”

 

                With that, Ruby slowly reached for the doorknob; everyone else stood in silent anticipation as she twisted it, and then, with as much force as she could, threw it open.

                The loud noise caused the person on the other side of the door to scream; the scream startled Blake, who created a shadow clone.

                Ruby and Yang, startled by Blake’s dark apparition, also screamed, and immediately latched onto each other.

                All the while, Jaune stood in now-silent horror in the light of the fridge, his back pressed against the counter next to it. “Ruby? What are you—”

                Nora started to laugh. “Jaune? _No_ , you’re the ghost?”

                Sun peeked into the room, his irritated, exhausted voice clearly fed-up already, despite not having a clue about what was going on. “Hey, what the hell is going on in here? Don’t you guys know—oh, hey, Blake. Yang.”

                “Sun.” Blake gave a small nod to him, offering a tired smile.

                “Oh, hey, we heard about a ghost, so. Nora wanted us to come check it out with her.” Yang laughed, rolling her eyes and gesturing to Jaune. “There’s the ghost.”

                “Oh, him? Yeah, I’ve caught him sneaking in here for the past couple of nights. He’s been eating whatever leftovers Sage and I cook? Seriously, it’s kinda jarring to walk in here and see him, but he’s no ghost.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the only thing i based this off of was that i had a vivid mental image of team rwby findin jaune diggin through a fridge at like 5am and blake screamed and made a shadow clone, which caused the others to scream, which caused sun to check on them, and well now i bingewrote this at 1am. fun image though, really fun


End file.
